The Tribune

EDITOR, The Tribune.

Nothing could “yuck up yuh vexation” faster than to suffer through the hollow words of an avowed hypocrite.

Loftus Roker seems to delight in giving a sanctimonious assessment of the political landscape and he supposes he has earned credibility simply because he is critical of Perry Christie and the PLP. He once sat at the same cabinet table with Christie and his acquiescence to Sir Lynden Pindling’s excesses helped lay the foundation for today’s corrupt PLP.

Reading his ad nauseam lambasting of Christie has become surreal. His critique rings hollow. He is an unindicted co-conspirator with today’s latest incarnation of incompetence, nepotism and self-aggrandisement that is rampant in the PLP.

When Mr Roker proclaimed that our political leaders are a tainted bag of apples he must have bit his tongue so hard he tasted blood. He was one of the farmers who plowed the field and planted the very same rotten seeds that he now says bears bitter fruit.

It’s an open secret that Mr Roker is not a man of high political conscience. Just check his inhumane treatment of Haitian immigrants back in the day. What few people know is that you can always count on him to choke when the chips are down and good men are called upon to act on their convictions.

Roker talked a good game back then when he saw the direction that Pindling was taking the country. He grumbled under his breath about the excesses, but never resigned because of those excesses. When Pindling trained his gaze in Loftus’ direction is when the cat made off with his tongue. Or perhaps he gambled that his tongue would better serve him if redeployed to kissing-up.

Mr Roker might remember that he ardently caucused with the dissidents who wanted to force Pindling to change the destructive tack he was on. But when the moment came to act he did not have the courage of his supposed convictions. Pindling (aka Sweet Mouth Willie) played to Roker’s ego over the years and he continued to sit in the front pew of the Pindling choir. He abandoned his fellow dissidents and then turned around and berated them.

He stayed there through the Commission of Inquiry. He was not a drum major protesting as the scourge of drugs gripped the nation. As his cabinet colleagues proclaimed “all for me, baby”, and “God gave this land to the PLP”, Roker stayed on.

Now he criticizes the “new age politicians” who prefer to sit back and witness “foolishness” than to speak out against it. Sounds familiar, Mr Roker?

It’s amazing how clearly he can spot faults in others, but not in himself. To show that his soul was now cleansed he reminded us that he called out alleged corruption back in 1977. He reported it to the House, controlled at the time by his party.

When the House (and by extension his party) rebuked him, what did he do? He didn’t resign on principle. He didn’t carry on the fight. He shut his mouth and soldiered on with Pindling.

But now that course of action – disciplined silence - exercised by today’s crop of politicians in his party, is anathema to everything he stands for.

Go back and read the transcript of what you said, Mr Roker. You proclaimed that young PLPs are sitting back and allowing the old ways you helped establish to run rampant now.

But when asked what you thought of the one man who is willing to shake the dilly tree within the PLP, the brave Alfred Sears, you cast aspersion on this Renaissance man who has the testicular fortitude to do what you wouldn’t. Stand up to the Leader of the PLP.

You and your righteous indignation almost 40 years after the fact must be ruled “out of order”. The PLP, and by extension we the people, are reaping the sour fruit you helped sow.

Thanks for nothing.

STALWART

Nassau,

September 4, 2016.